Free Republic

LONDON (AP) — The Russian ruble on Monday reached its lowest value since the early weeks of the war in Ukraine as Moscow increases military spending and Western sanctions weigh on its energy exports.It led Russia's central bank to announce an emergency meeting for Tuesday to review its key interest rate, raising the likelihood of an increase in borrowing costs that would support the flagging ruble.The Russian currency had passed 101 rubles to the dollar, continuing a more than one-third decline in its value since the beginning of the year and hitting the lowest level in almost 17 months. The...

Russia’s central bank on Tuesday hiked interest rates by 350 basis points to 12% at an emergency meeting, as Moscow looks to halt a rapid depreciation of the country’s ruble currency. The ruble slumped to near 102 to the dollar on Monday, as President Vladimir Putin’s economic advisor, Maxim Oreshkin, penned an op-ed in Russian state-owned Tass news agency that blamed the plunging currency and the acceleration of inflation on the “loose monetary policy” of the central bank.

President Vladimir Putin's economic adviser rebuked the central bank on Monday as the rouble slid past 101 per U.S. dollar, blaming its 30% year-to-date slump on loose monetary policy and revealing growing discord among Russia's monetary authorities. The rouble, which has lost around a quarter of its value against the dollar since Putin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022, hit 101.04 per U.S. dollar, its weakest point in almost 17 months. As the rouble tumbled, Putin's economic adviser Maxim Oreshkin said in an op-ed for the TASS news agency that the Kremlin wanted a strong rouble and expected a...

Vladimir Putin suffered a humiliating blow on the world stage this week after the Russian ruble crashed yet again, with one Ruble now worth exactly one US cent. One hundred Rubles is now worth just one dollar, as the Russian currency appears on the verge of collapsing. The currency crash is the latest humiliating blow for Vladimir Putin, who has poured billions into his war with Ukraine. The stunning decline of the currency sparked a televised meltdown this week among Kremlin allies. remlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov, who is often seen as a mouthpiece for President Putin, demanded an explanation from...

With Crimea potentially breaking away from Ukraine and the ongoing risk of conflict, it’s time to revisit the topic. I explained a few weeks ago that decentralization was one way of defusing the crisis. Now Kevin Hassett of the American Enterprise Institute has a refreshing and important analysis explaining how bad economic policy has hindered Ukraine’s development. He explains that Ukraine was one of the former Soviet Bloc nations that made the mistake of not copying the more market-oriented nations of Western Europe. Prior to the breakup [of the Soviet Empire], Eastern Europe was underdeveloped relative to the West, mostly...